We think Maguire's is the best place to souse oneself and absorb the Irish bard's musings on beauty and love because (a) it's a bar -- the booze is already there, and (b) it's a bar with three Yeats verses framed on the walls of the south room, a handy touch if you've forgotten your own copy of his collected works. "Never give all the heart, for love/Will hardly seem worth thinking of /For everything that's lovely is/But a brief, dreamy delight." So go ahead. Keep the Harp lagers coming and forget about your latest heartbreak. If Yeats found solace in his words, so can you. At the very least, his lines will give you something to focus on when the room starts spinning.

After 14 years this sprawling event is still pretty much the only game in town. Its days as a scrappy little upstart are long gone, replaced by an ambitious schedule that screens more than a hundred flicks from all over the world over the course of three and a half weeks. Sometimes it seems as if executive director Gregory von Hausch wants the festival to be all things to all people, but he also continues to have shrewd instincts. Year before last he gave Affliction and Little Voice exposure long before they snagged their Oscar nominations, and for the most recent festival he did the same with Pedro Almodóvar's now-acclaimed All About My Mother, which went on to win an Oscar, and Tumbleweeds, which didn't. He also unearthed such still-overlooked gems as Joe the King and The War Zone and brought gay icon Bruce Vilanch to the masses with the riotous documentary Get Bruce!

After 14 years this sprawling event is still pretty much the only game in town. Its days as a scrappy little upstart are long gone, replaced by an ambitious schedule that screens more than a hundred flicks from all over the world over the course of three and a half weeks. Sometimes it seems as if executive director Gregory von Hausch wants the festival to be all things to all people, but he also continues to have shrewd instincts. Year before last he gave Affliction and Little Voice exposure long before they snagged their Oscar nominations, and for the most recent festival he did the same with Pedro Almodóvar's now-acclaimed All About My Mother, which went on to win an Oscar, and Tumbleweeds, which didn't. He also unearthed such still-overlooked gems as Joe the King and The War Zone and brought gay icon Bruce Vilanch to the masses with the riotous documentary Get Bruce!

Long before Haitian art became fashionable -- a dozen years ago, to be exact -- gallery owner Katie Barr was struggling to make her mark in the competitive South Florida art market. She started out with a tiny space in a nondescript little shopping plaza in Boca Raton, where she attracted potential customers with cheese-and-wine receptions and began building up a selection of world-class art from the tiny island nation's disproportionate population of artists. Three years ago she moved her shop to a slightly larger space a few feet away from bustling Atlantic Avenue in downtown Delray Beach. Her business boomed, but her mission remains the same: sharing her knowledge and enthusiasm for some of the most exuberant art in the world, which she stocks in all its amazing variety, from paintings on canvas and board to metal sculptures to beaded vodou flags to decorative furniture and more.

Long before Haitian art became fashionable -- a dozen years ago, to be exact -- gallery owner Katie Barr was struggling to make her mark in the competitive South Florida art market. She started out with a tiny space in a nondescript little shopping plaza in Boca Raton, where she attracted potential customers with cheese-and-wine receptions and began building up a selection of world-class art from the tiny island nation's disproportionate population of artists. Three years ago she moved her shop to a slightly larger space a few feet away from bustling Atlantic Avenue in downtown Delray Beach. Her business boomed, but her mission remains the same: sharing her knowledge and enthusiasm for some of the most exuberant art in the world, which she stocks in all its amazing variety, from paintings on canvas and board to metal sculptures to beaded vodou flags to decorative furniture and more.

Nilo Cruz's haunting A Bicycle Country, a play about three Cuban balseros, arrived at the Florida Stage just a few weeks after rafter Elián Gonzalez was rescued off nearby Palm Beach. Here's betting it will be remembered long after young Elián grows up. Set in Cuba and in the waters between Havana and Miami, the play stakes a claim in the dramatic territory of Samuel Beckett, with its evocative language, startling visual imagery, and existential concerns. Cruz's portrayal of the trio who escape from Cuba is both literal and metaphorical. Indeed, less a political play than a statement about yearning, A Bicycle Country is capable of transcending the narrow politics of 1999 and 2000 and becoming a work that can shed light on any group of desperate people. Which is exactly what great art is supposed to do.